Thirty-five years ago, the epic miniseries Roots was first broadcast on ABC television.  I was 10 years old, and I don’t remember how I felt about this portrayal of slavery.  I do know that since then, I have avoided watching any movies related to slavery.  I have been afraid to stir up any of the emotions that I knew would come to the surface if I dared look too closely at this country’s history of race.    I didn’t want to look back, but this week during our Immersion, I decided to look over my shoulder into some of the history of abolition, slavery and poverty. 

Traveling with us this week was Capacity Arts, a small cohort of CUNY students working on their thesis project.  They led us through several icebreakers and workshops, which were all building toward the finale of the work we did together on the trip.  During this exercise, they placed several pictures on the tables in the room.  Each of these pictures represented aspects of life in antebellum Baltimore.  We examined each photo until we settled on the one photo that we felt connected to in some way.  As the workshop progressed, we developed the story of the character in that photo.  At my table was a photograph of a woman, a group of girls attending a boarding school and a large group of students led by a male teacher.  I chose the woman and I built a story around her.  I was a freedwoman living in Baltimore.  I knew other teachers.  I felt it was my responsibility to teach the girls in my care more than reading, writing, arithmetic.  I had to teach them how to function in a society where their freedom could be taken at whim.

As the exercise progressed, we were forced to consider decisions that might put our lives in grave danger, namely helping a slave escape or attending an abolitionist meeting.  The decisions I made about these choices were based on my relationship with my students.  I wanted to protect them but show them that even with limits, there were actions we could take to help somebody. There were moments during the dramatic portions of the exercise when I felt anxious, angry, and afraid for some of the other characters.  I felt helpless as it became clearer and clearer that being a Freedwoman would mean absolutely nothing if a white person in power wanted to deny my freedom.  As I type this I realize this understanding of freedom must seem painfully obvious and naive.  I should know better, right?  Regardless, this exercise was a effective corrective to what we’ve (not) been taught about slavery.  Short of time travel, I don’t know how else we could imagine their lives.  I also began to realize that the reason why I gravitated to this woman’s photo is that I am that woman.  I have a responsibility to let the young women and girls in my life know how to function in a world that will treat them as if they don’t matter, as if they are not free even in 2012.  I cried when I realized just how closely tied I am to a nameless woman in old picture.  So much has changed and nothing at all has changed. 

I was getting hit on all sides from the very first day of the Immersion and by the time I left on Saturday afternoon, I was emotionally and physically exhausted.  I can’t and won’t claim that a week of intense study of America’s slavery past was more difficult for me than for my white and Latin-American counterparts.  One of the other participants shared with me on the very first day that when he’s in these spaces he feels like he’s walking through other people’s wounds.  If we’re going to do this work of ending poverty, we need to do the kind of work that compels us to talk not just about poverty but honestly and deeply about the intersections of race, class, gender and privilege as well.  We may not like what we see, but even in this “post-racial” society, we need to see it together.

For me, to look back is to embrace the philosophy embodied in the mythical Sankofa bird.  The bird is flying forward into its future, but its head is turned around to pick up pieces of its past.  The symbol tells us to go back and fetch the lessons of our history so we can move forward.  I’ve admired the Sankofa bird for a very long time, but I never realized until now that I don’t know what that bird does with those pieces or how long she carries them forward.  The Immersion has ended, but the stories linger.  That woman in that photograph is still with me and probably will be with me for a long time.  I’ve taken an honest look back, and I’ve picked up several pieces.  Now comes the difficult work of carrying these pieces of history and the pieces of me forward in this movement to end poverty.  ~KEM

Years ago, I was in a basic economics class in which the professor was telling us of the inequalities embedded in capitalism. He spoke of malls as the “cathedrals” of capitalism. Shopping Centers are one of those places Americans go to renew their “faith” in consumerism- after all, didn’t our previous president tell us to go shopping in response to 9/11? It is in malls like the one in which we did our flash mob action today where such “worship” is often conducted. A form of worship that perpetuates consumerism, for we often we feel inadequate without those clothes, baubles, playstations and other goods we buy in such temples. Today in our action, my lens on these cathedrals changed a bit. I witnessed the mall in a different light. We had just spend a day and a half learning about the challenges of the working poor in Baltimore, many of whom are forced to accept low play, inadequate health care, sexual harassment, summary dismissal and other poor working conditions in order to live. Our experience of learning about the community culminated in a small action facilitated by United Workers in which we started at the food court of the mall at the top and marched down to the entrance, passing our flyers and singing both newly created songs and modified ones. In this brief action, I witnessed a range of reactions from people in the mall- from amusement, to indifference, to hostility on behalf of mall security. Usually when I attend protests it is “within the barricade”. But Occupy movements around the country have risen to the challenge of meeting the deepening inequalities with a more creative and vibrant protest art. The mall is no Cathedral, and the restaurants in the Inner Harbor are no “welcoming table”. From what we have learned from United Workers, GGP, the corporation that operates these developments, may make them seem such with glittering fountains and food that comes out of the kitchen in less than 10 minutes, but by and large they are not offering fair development practices to those workers. For six minutes today, however, we started to chip at the facade of this false cathedral. Those who are consumers at that mall and those who are workers became a bit more visible to one another- and to me, our action was almost the same as throwing the money changers out of the temple. Valerie Freseman 1/19/2012